From nobody Sat Aug 9 14:16:25 2025 X-Original-To: freebsd-current@mlmmj.nyi.freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2610:1c1:1:606c::19:1]) by mlmmj.nyi.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4bzjcv2Y3Zz64NNx for ; Sat, 09 Aug 2025 14:16:31 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from dg@dglawrence.com) Received: from dglawrence.com (dglawrence.com [50.76.111.10]) (using TLSv1.3 with cipher TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384 (256/256 bits) key-exchange X25519 server-signature RSA-PSS (4096 bits) server-digest SHA256 client-signature RSA-PSS (2048 bits) client-digest SHA256) (Client CN "mailx.dglawrence.com", Issuer "mailx.dglawrence.com" (not verified)) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 4bzjct6lqwz3MDC; Sat, 09 Aug 2025 14:16:30 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from dg@dglawrence.com) Authentication-Results: mx1.freebsd.org; none Received: from mailx.dglawrence.com ([10.19.1.8]) by dglawrence.com (8.15.2/8.15.2) with ESMTPS id 579EGPv5046677 (version=TLSv1.3 cipher=TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384 bits=256 verify=NO); Sat, 9 Aug 2025 07:16:25 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from dg@dglawrence.com) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/simple; d=dglawrence.com; s=ab7ba439; t=1754748985; bh=R9u8/nBq8rjkGPksXiE729gLhPrVc2JimqxTfszq8FY=; h=Date:From:To:Cc:Subject:References:In-Reply-To; b=0B2g52N6sLDKBf34umJeeuDTRd+VRlZKoXFIjR2KgvJAqvdyl+SfyjV+qiq8bRBsF sJcmLmuRaOHfVGOL4Lr8zI6crAe5mGDFy/Lw2CZMnoZ/r/iSJTtYmQNE+BGZ1MyfsM w5rIE5s4eceEEwe/aaaQRryTdVHUbmGGlO0bnD5I= Received: (from dg@localhost) by mailx.dglawrence.com (8.15.2/8.15.2/Submit) id 579EGPSf046676; Sat, 9 Aug 2025 07:16:25 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from dg@dglawrence.com) Date: Sat, 9 Aug 2025 07:16:25 -0700 From: David G Lawrence To: Tomoaki AOKI Cc: Warner Losh , Michal Meloun , FreeBSD Current Subject: Re: PKGBASE Removes FreeBSD Base System Feature Message-ID: <20250809141625.GW26557@mailx.dglawrence.com> References: <20250809062925.GN26557@mailx.dglawrence.com> <929543B2-633E-44B5-B6F6-F292CCEADAB3@freebsd.org> <20250809065247.GO26557@mailx.dglawrence.com> <96820ff6-bdb0-4d25-ad78-502e30b7e479@FreeBSD.org> <20250809185418.7d272536dd5862d0bdfd39c2@dec.sakura.ne.jp> <20250809101145.GS26557@mailx.dglawrence.com> <20250809114244.GU26557@mailx.dglawrence.com> <20250809224836.f7207c3be3fbc8e0fd97f856@dec.sakura.ne.jp> List-Id: Discussions about the use of FreeBSD-current List-Archive: https://lists.freebsd.org/archives/freebsd-current List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: Sender: owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20250809224836.f7207c3be3fbc8e0fd97f856@dec.sakura.ne.jp> X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.6.2 (dglawrence.com [10.19.1.8]); Sat, 09 Aug 2025 07:16:25 -0700 (PDT) X-Rspamd-Queue-Id: 4bzjct6lqwz3MDC X-Spamd-Bar: ---- X-Rspamd-Pre-Result: action=no action; module=replies; Message is reply to one we originated X-Spamd-Result: default: False [-4.00 / 15.00]; REPLY(-4.00)[]; ASN(0.00)[asn:7922, ipnet:50.76.0.0/14, country:US] > > But now I'm going to say something controversial: I was disappointed > > by the reaction about AI, and how it could help the project, in the > > developers list. While I fully appreciate the concerns about "stealing" > > other people's work (indirectly through the training of the vast corpus of > > the Internet) - i.e., the potential to violate copyright, what was said in > > that thread - to dismiss what AI could do for the project, for the > > development cycle - was exceptionally, tragically, myopic. Most people in > > the world (and here I mean 5 Sigma +) have no idea what's about to hit > > them. I've been deep in AI research recently and I can tell you, first > > hand, well...we're in for interesting times ahead. We can either embrace > > it or be tossed into the scrap heap of history. > > My opinion about AI-generated codes is that "need to be clarified in > international law about copyrights and licenses first". > But it is, AFAIK, still in discussion at each countries. Not at UN. > This is the fatal problem. > > My assumption is "if the operator specifies the license to be > (including possibly to be) applied to the resulting codes, > AI referres only to non-violating knowledges/data/codes and > generate codes" is needed to be implemented by AI guys. I would caution against the assumption that the most advanced AI today somehow outputs some chunk of copyrighted code "verbatim". That may have occurred in what I would consider _ancient_ models, the training processes have changed dramatically in recent times. While I can't make any definitive statements about what other AIs do or how they were trained, I can say that the modern approach is to have each batch of training be re-written by another model to be semantically and logically the same (and I'm not just talking about code here), but different in how it is expressed so that it captures the _idea_, but not the verbatim text. While it is true that there really aren't too many ways to say "for (i = 0; i < N; i++)", that, usually, is about where the similarity ends with the original code. What used to happen in AI is a phenomenon called, I think inappropriately, "overfitting", which basically means that the model memorized an exact text because it was trained on that exact text repeatedly with no variation. In this case, it doesn't generalize the concept - it's more like a parrot. But, let's take a step back and look more generally at AI. Everyone, for some reason, seems to be assuming that AI can only be used for coding. I didn't say that - and I didn't even mean to suggest it. I am talking more about using AI in development workflows to make it easier to examine the proper functioning of the code that _you_ have written or that _others_ have contributed. The AI doesn't need to write one line of code. It can just analyze what you have written and make helpful suggestions on how you can improve it. And AI can do much more than that. It can help you when you're struggling with architectural directions - big picture stuff. It could help the project by being a first line of analysis of submitted bug reports. It could be an oracle of knowledge for users about how to set up FreeBSD, administer it, and solve user problems. If anyone in the project wants to use AI - for whatever of these use-cases, the very first thing you will need is: An Open Mind. -DG * Dr. David G. Lawrence * * DG Labs Pave the road of life with opportunities.